Gap Year
by LemonOut1
Summary: AU. Meredith, an American girl fresh out of high school, takes a gap year and ends up in Rome, where she crosses paths with a driven and strong-willed Cristina, a romantic and idealistic Derek, and a brave and loyal Owen - among many, and embarks with them on a journey of friendship and self discovery. (MerDer & Crowen)
1. Chapter 1

I started this story a while ago and finally got around to edit it and proof read it a little. I know I should probably update the stories I already started posting first, but I thought that while I'm still fixing a few things that I'm not completely happy with, I might as well start posting a few chapters of this story (I'm done with four chapters and I'll be posting them all possibly this week."

This story will be focusing on Meredith and Cristina's friendship a lot, but I promise there will be a lot of Cristina/Owen and Meredith/Derek in the following chapters. The gap year part was inspired by my own and my friend's experiences in a foreign country, fresh out of high school, trying to figure out what to do with our lives, and enjoying our first taste of independence, thousands of miles away from our families, finally discovering who we were as opposed to who we were told we were - if you ever studied abroad, you probably know what I mean.

I hope you enjoy reading this. I promise to update soon. Please leave reviews! I love to hear opinions and constructive criticism. xx

**Chapter 1**

* * *

Meredith woke up with a start. It took her a few seconds to realize where she was. She looked around in the dark dorm room with sleepy eyes, trying to locate the source of the noise that had interrupted her sleep, when she heard muffled sobs coming from the lower bunk of her bed. She rolled her eyes. Homesick teenagers were not really her thing. She was told culture shock and homesickness could be tough on some people, but she considered all that psych talk to be nothing more than a bunch of crap. She had not shed a tear before boarding her plane from Boston to Italy; she had not gotten panicky when the taxi driver could not understand her broken Italian; she had not felt the pang in her heart as she arrived at the empty, unfamiliar, dorm room…

She looked at the alarm clock on the bedside table next to the bunk bed and sighed - it was barely past midnight. She closed her eyes trying to get herself to sleep again and to ignore the incessant sobbing, but a voice coming from the bed on the opposite side of the room startled her.

"Are you going to stop crying anytime soon?"

The girl who spoke so bluntly turned on the reading light on her bedside table and continued.

"My jet lag is already a bitch, I can't really handle your sobbing right now," she stated with an annoyed tone.

Meredith smirked as she made eye contact with the thin, serious looking Asian girl, who was now standing in the middle of the room wearing an old ratty t-shirt and pajama pants, trying to pull her wild, dark hair in a ponytail and obviously having some trouble with it.

With a sigh, the girl walked towards Meredith's bed and stood there, just a few feet away, looking down at the girl whose sobs still hadn't subsided.

"Do you speak English?" she asked impatiently.

Meredith looked down from the edge of her mattress just in time to see her bunkmate, a blonde girl who was probably 16 or 17, shake her head. She took a deep breath, considering whether it was worth it to get involved in the discussion or not, then, against her better judgement, she jumped off the top bunk, and introduced herself.

"My name is Meredith. What's your name? Where are you from?" she said trying to speak as slowly and as clearly possible.

The girl looked at her, trying to control her crying, and drying her tears with her sheets.

"My name is Halina, I am from Poland," she replied with a feeble voice, and with a strong foreign accent.

Meredith smirked and turned around to face the other girl.

"Great. Know any Polish?" she inquired.

"Nope," the girl responded returning Meredith's smirk. "I'm Cristina, by the way. I didn't know you were American, too."

Meredith nodded and turned her attention back to Halina, whose crying had started once again.

"Do you need anything? Water? Tissues?" she asked trying to sound understanding.

"Xanax?" added Cristina.

Halina gave her a mean look through her tears.

"Well, she did understand that!" she reacted to Meredith's disapproving look. "Ahh, whatever. I give her a week."

Meredith tried to mask her laugh as she walked towards her still unpacked suitcases, grabbed a pair of flip-flops out of the front pocket of one of them, and a bottle of tequila from her backpack.

"Wanna go for a walk?" she asked Cristina, who nodded enthusiastically grabbing a sweatshirt from the pile of clothes at the foot of her bed, and a worn pair of uggs from an open suitcase.

"Smith, huh?" asked Meredith pointing at Cristina's sweatshirt as they walked down the quiet hallway.

"Yes, but I deferred," she explained. "My high school counselor recommended taking a gap year because I was getting – and I'll quote him, 'burned out.' Bunch of bullshit if you ask me…"

Meredith laughed at Cristina's frustrated tone. "All women college… That sounds pretty intense."

"I'm very focused," explained Cristina.

Meredith nodded, opening the bottle of tequila, taking a big gulp, and then passing the bottle to her new friend.

"I deferred, too. But just because I'm not sure of what I want to do with my life, yet," explained Meredith. "My mom wasn't too enthusiastic about it. She went on and on saying that only halfwits would choose to deferred Dartmouth…"

Cristina did a spit take in surprise after taking a sip of tequila "You got into Dartmouth?" she asked, her eyes widened in shock.

"Hey! Don't waste my tequila," laughed Meredith. "And wow, you sounded just like my mother."

"I... I didn't want it to come out like that," apologized Cristina. "I mean, you have streaks of pink in your hair, for God's sake. I thought you were some sort of high school dropout."

Meredith smirked taking the bottle of tequila from Christina and treating herself to another generous gulp. "These," she explained pointing at the pink streaks on the ends of her otherwise dark blond hair, "were part of my rebellious phase. I'm letting them grow out; they'll probably be gone with the next haircut."

Cristina nodded, making a mental note to ask about just how rebellious her new friend actually used to be.

"Did you already decide on a major?" Meredith asked interrupting Cristina's thoughts.

"Biochemistry," she replied promptly. "I'm already set to go to med school. I want to be a surgeon, a cardiothoracic surgeon, I think. I'd consider general. I'm not 100% sure about that yet, but yeah, most likely a cardiothoracic surgeon."

Meredith smiled at how her new friend's face had lit up with excitement. "Yeah, I can picture that. You as a surgeon, I mean. My mom is a general surgeon…"

Cristina's eyes widened. "She is? You're so lucky. My mother is an interior decorator, not nearly as exciting being a surgeon. Is she an attending? Where is she working?"

Meredith suppressed a laugh. "Jeez, if you're going to be talking surgery to me, I'll need another one of those," she said pointing at the bottle of tequila and taking another gulp.

"So?" inquired Cristina impatiently.

"She's an attending general surgeon at Mass Gen. Surgery is everything she ever talks about… She's been trying to convince me to follow in her footsteps…" she explained.

"Why won't you?" Cristina asked sitting down on a marble bench on the side of the quiet street, and taking a sip of tequila.

"I might. I don't know. You sounded so passionate talking about wanting to be a surgeon. I don't feel like that. I don't have that drive…"

"It will come," Cristina stated. "It's in your DNA."

Meredith smirked. "That's not very scientific."

"It's the tequila. It's throwing me off my game," explained Cristina, looking at the thin girl sitting next to her. She never really had girl friends; her driven personality had scared all of them away. Even though she had only known Meredith for just about 30 minutes, she could feel an affinity with her.

Meredith breathed in deeply and sat next to the dark haired girl.

"The air smells different here. It's nothing like Boston," she said with a content tone.

"Beverly Hills smells like car exhaust," stated Cristina matter-of-factly.

"Look at us, underage American girls drinking tequila on the street of the Eternal City…" she giggled taking another sip.

"Are you going to go mushy on me?" laughed Cristina, following Meredith's example and talking another gulp.

"Never!" stated Meredith faking a stern tone.

The two girls sat on the bench for hours, talking and laughing as if they had known each other for years. By the time the sun started coming up, the tequila was long gone.


	2. Chapter 2

AN: Thanks for reading and reviewing. I hope you're enjoying the story. I'll be updating soon (possibly tomorrow?). Please let me know what you think! -P

* * *

Cristina opened her eyes. She turned around on her bed, only to see Meredith, lying next to her. Her head was pounding, and she could still taste the tequila in her mouth, which caused her a very unpleasant wave of nausea. She slowly sat up and shook Meredith's shoulder to wake her up.

"Meredith. Meredith, wake up, it's 12! We missed the orientation!" she said with a panicky tone after looking at the clock on her bedside table.

She took a deep breath as another wave of nausea took over. When it passed, she tried once again to shake Meredith's shoulder, this time a little more vigorously, maybe too vigorously as she caused her sleeping friend to fall from the single bed and land on the floor with a loud thud.

"Oh my God, Meredith, are you okay?" Cristina asked getting out of her bed.

Meredith slowly opened her eyes and looked up at Cristina. "Ouch… Why did you do that?"

"I was trying to wake you up and well, you're very light," she explained Cristina apologetically, trying not to laugh.

Meredith's expression slowly morphed from confused, to amused, to completely exhilarated, until she just started laughing out loud, still on the floor, holding her empty bottle of tequila.

Cristina joined the laughing, and ungraciously sat down on the floor next to Meredith. "Are you still drunk?"

"Possibly," replied Meredith between one fit of laughter and another.

"Get your ass off the floor. We missed the orientation…" Christina said trying to compose herself.

"Help me up," said Meredith and Cristina obliged. "I think we need a shower. It smells like a distillery in here…"

"How are you so chirpy?" Cristina asked. "I feel like there's an elephant dancing on my head."

Meredith tilted her head to one side, considering Cristina's problem. "Screw the shower. Do you know what's the best cure for a hangover?"

"Hmm… Aspirin? Coffee? A 10 hours long nap?" replied Cristina shrugging her shoulders.

"Going for a swim!" exclaimed Meredith, running towards her suitcases. "I hope you packed a bikini!"

Cristina just laid down on the floor covering her eyes with her hands. "I hate Italy…"

* * *

"If we woke up in time for the orientation we would have known the pool was a 30 minutes walk away from the dorm. And I would have never agreed to walk that far; in the heat; hungover!" Cristina wined putting her belongings down next to a poolside chaise lounge.

Meredith ignored her, and proceeded to take off the white coverup she was wearing, and adjust her bikini.

"C'mon, let's jump in the pool!" she said, slightly annoyed at Cristina's apathetic attitude.

"I'm fine here, with my clothes on. On dry land," Cristina replied laying down on the chaise lounge.

"Cristina Yang, you get your ass out of that chair. NOW!" she exclaimed Meredith with an authoritarian tone.

"Why? Do you know how dirty community pools actually are? It's like an orgy of bacteria in there!" she retorted.

"You want to be a doctor, you're going to be exposed to germs all the time!" gave Meredith as a comeback.

Cristina rolled her eyes, unsure of what to reply to her friend's last statement.

"Now, get your ass and your grandma one-piece in the pool!" continued Meredith barely containing her laugher at the sight of Cristina's swimsuit.

"For your information, this is what professional swimmers wear," she said proudly defending her choice of swimwear.

Meredith smirked "And you're a professional swimmer?"

Christina returned her smirk. "If you must know, I've swam my fair share of laps in my step father's pool," she announced solemnly, confidently walking towards the pool's border only to elegantly dive into the water.

Meredith sat down on the edge of the pool, letting her feet into the water, and looked at Cristina swimming from one end to the pool to the other and back, only to stop right in front of her to come up for air.

"So, are you gonna come in for a swim or not?" Cristina asked.

"Are you crazy?" Meredith laughed. "I didn't think you were actually going to dive in. There's fecal matter in there. And contrary to popular belief, chlorine is not a god-sent instant germ killer."

Cristina put up a faux angry expression but couldn't keep it up for long. "You are sooo going to pay for this!" she said grabbing Meredith by the ankles and trying to drag her into the pool.

Meredith tried to find something to grasp to avoid getting dragged in the water. Her struggle quickly proved to be pointless, as just after a few seconds, she found herself ending up inside the pool with a not so elegant splash.

"You are unusually strong for a person your size,' she said between laughs, trying to protect her face from Cristina's water splashes.

"So are you!" retorted Cristina joining the laughs.

Quickly recovering from being dragged into the water against her will, Meredith tried to return Cristina's splashes, moving as much water as she could and trying to keep her bikini top in place at the same time.

"Don't' you wish you were wearing a one piece too, now?" she teased Cristina looking at her struggling to keep her breasts covered.

"Never!" Meredith replied giving up on her bikini and finally using both of her arms to force the other girl underwater.

She had barely finished talking when she felt two strong arms grabbing her and Cristina by their waists and dragging them out of the pool. She didn't register what was going on, until she heard her friend's angry voice.

"Get away from us, you perv! What do you think you're doing?" she yelled the brunette, pushing away the man that had just dragged them out of the pool.

"What the hell!" She echoed her friend, standing up and adjusting her bikini top.

The man was looking at them with a confused expression. Meredith looked at Cristina.

"Maybe he doesn't speak English?" she suggested.

Cristina ignored her. "Seriously, what's wrong with you? Do you just go around feeling 18 year old girls up?"

The man cleared his throat. "I thought you were drowning…" he said – his pale skin, slowly becoming redder and redder for the embarrassment.

"You're American?" asked Meredith in surprise.

He nodded. "It looked like you were struggling and I just jumped in…"

"You're not even a lifeguard," interrupted Cristina.

"No. No, I'm not…" he explained, looking at Cristina with an intense expression. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to scare you or… feel you up."

"It's okay. I mean, I guess if we were actually drowning it would have been a pretty heroic gesture," said Meredith shrugging her shoulders and awkwardly looking at Cristina and the red haired man, who were just staring at each other.

"And well, it looks like the actual lifeguard is preoccupied…" she continued pointing at a tanned guy sitting on the lifeguard tower and flirting with two girls on the opposite side of the pool. "So, yeah, thank you. I guess."

She gathered hers and Cristina's stuff quickly, feeling a little out of place as Cristina and the tall stranger just stood there silently looking at each.

"Want to go take a shower?" she said clearing her throat, trying to get Cristina's attention and finally succeeding.

"Sure. Yes. A shower sounds good," the brunette replied breaking eye contact with the man and following Meredith to the women's locker room.

"I'm Owen. Owen Hunt," the man yelled after her, giving her a small, apologetic smile.

She turned around and gave him a small nod. "I'm Cristina…" she said as he walked towards the exit, but she was not sure he even heard her.


End file.
